LIVID MEN, VIOLENT MEN: To a Broken Link
Since THE EMPRISE REVIEW has been cast into the void, probably for quite some time now. Here is my poem, the only poem of mine that they hosted, although I never received any word of its publication, had to dig and dig and dig until finding it uploaded and, apparently published, but they remained silent and forever out of touch:
Livid Men, Violent Men
They felt the slop of this city when garbled voices bellowed; - crept to the tenth floor and watched through curtained windows. Perched over the drained canal, an orb bled open the train tunnel. Earth: digging, pounding, crushing; a skull stomped on the sidewalk. One worker, on the day of the black haze, slapped men, livid men, violent men. Choking air: his boy spit into a woman’s mouth. Hounds of the Other Waste swarmed, violated bus passengers between stops. The smell of mussed hair, their dirt encrusted nails. Fingers and zipper - his wedding photograph in a stranger’s bedroom. Police officers were napping in the back on the day of the incident. One officer awoke, slumbered an apology. The cameras in this city, he said, will not help you; others might hurt you. Near dark at six. He, engulfed in dust, smoked Chinese cigarettes on the roof after dipping raw mutton slices in boiling oil. Dead adultery in Mandarin. Ah, to be adrift here, the boy said, lashed the whip at the photograph. We have passed all points of departure. The end stop is a train tunnel that will take us out of this city. There are no tickets, he tells the boy. There never were. Never.
